ABSTRACT
Air carriers tend to maximize the utilization of each aircraft by maximizing the number of its daily flights. This chapter examines the possible impact of flight delay and cancellation on the air carrier schedule. Air carriers and pilots might negotiate more relaxed operational rules in their contract to improve the quality of life for the crew. The schedules of the different aircraft and crew members are put together to form the total schedule of the air carrier. Typically in the air carrier schedule, a flight feeds its resources to one or more downline flights. Scheduled events include flight departures, flight arrivals, crew duty starts, crew releases from duty, aircraft maintenance starts and ends. The chapter explains the queuing models to present a simple analytical model that separates the controllable factors that influence delays and the propagation of delays in the National Airspace System (NAS) from the factors that are random variables.
